As a owner of the current 2011 MacBook Pro, it's pretty obvious that the cooling system wasn't designed for 45W TDP CPUs.

I have the early 2011 15" 2.0GHz model and I don't see a problem with the cooling on my particular unit. I've only ever had the fans kick a fuss on two occasions: 1) MS Excel sent 1 core to 100% for 30mins and even then, the fans weren't that loud - and 2) MacPorts sent all 4 cores to 100% for 45mins when installing software - sounded like it was taking off but thats to be expected under such high load. Though under normal use its never went over 60˚C.

I have the early 2011 15" 2.0GHz model and I don't see a problem with the cooling on my particular unit. I've only ever had the fans kick a fuss on two occasions: 1) MS Excel sent 1 core to 100% for 30mins and even then, the fans weren't that loud - and 2) MacPorts sent all 4 cores to 100% for 45mins when installing software - sounded like it was taking off but thats to be expected under such high load. Though under normal use its never went over 60˚C.

What do you consider "normal use"? I had my MBP shoot up to 185F with mail, safari and iChat open running a video chat. Normally, I have to run FCP-X or Handbrake to get the temps up that high. I even took it to the Apple store and all their tests found no problems. They still couldn't explain why, at identical temps and fan speeds, my mid '10 MBP is noticeably quieter. They claim the fans are the same size on my dual-core i5 MBP and the quad-core i7 MBP.

What do you consider "normal use"? I had my MBP shoot up to 185F with mail, safari and iChat open running a video chat. Normally, I have to run FCP-X or Handbrake to get the temps up that high. I even took it to the Apple store and all their tests found no problems. They still couldn't explain why, at identical temps and fan speeds, my mid '10 MBP is noticeably quieter. They claim the fans are the same size on my dual-core i5 MBP and the quad-core i7 MBP.

Normal use for me us as follows:
Photoshop, Dreamweaver, iChat, Transmit, iCal, Mail (with 3 accounts), Safari (with GoogleMail and three Magento windows), LibreOffice Base, Terminal with various SSH sessions and Address Book. I may another Safari window with BBC Radio or iTunes.

Same thing every day, 5 days a week, 8 and a half hours a day from 8:30am to 5pm. Current CPU Temp is 54C - can't hear a peep from the fans.

EDIT: Also forgot the Windows XP virtual machine I use every now and then.

Normal use for me us as follows:
Photoshop, Dreamweaver, iChat, Transmit, iCal, Mail (with 3 accounts), Safari (with GoogleMail and three Magento windows), LibreOffice Base, Terminal with various SSH sessions and Address Book. I may another Safari window with BBC Radio or iTunes.

Same thing every day, 5 days a week, 8 and a half hours a day from 8:30am to 5pm. Current CPU Temp is 54C - can't hear a peep from the fans.

EDIT: Also forgot the Windows XP virtual machine I use every now and then.

Hmm. Right now I have Aperture, Safari (5 tabs including Gmail), Mail (2 accounts) & iChat (text chat) running and I'm around 43°C. The fans are idling at 2000RPM and that's all normal. The truth is, they'll stay there until the CPU and GPU really start to heat up. The problem for me is, anytime I run anything processor intensive, the thing switches to jet engine mode and in a quiet room (like my home office), it can be pretty distracting. This is my fourth MBP and the first time I've ever had one this noisy.

Hmm. Right now I have Aperture, Safari (5 tabs including Gmail), Mail (2 accounts) & iChat (text chat) running and I'm around 43°C. The fans are idling at 2000RPM and that's all normal. The truth is, they'll stay there until the CPU and GPU really start to heat up. The problem for me is, anytime I run anything processor intensive, the thing switches to jet engine mode and in a quiet room (like my home office), it can be pretty distracting. This is my fourth MBP and the first time I've ever had one this noisy.

My fans don't instantly switch to Jet Engine mode when I do something processor intensive. They'll slowly increase in speed as the temperature climbs, as it should. Actually, I've only had jet engine mode once when all 4 cores were 100% when installing something via MacPorts (so take off is expected in that case). Excel causing a single core to run at 100% just caused them to whir slightly.

My fans don't instantly switch to Jet Engine mode when I do something processor intensive. They'll slowly increase in speed as the temperature climbs, as it should. Actually, I've only had jet engine mode once when all 4 cores were 100% when installing something via MacPorts (so take off is expected in that case). Excel causing a single core to run at 100% just caused them to whir slightly.

Well, mine ramp up too (sorry if I wasn't clear on that). When I first got the laptop, I was installing Toast 11 and it did something similar with the CPU usage and next thing I know, the fans are whirring away at 6000+ RPM. Otherwise, it'll take a video encode to make them go crazy like that. Thanks for the feedback BTW.

People like you don't bring in enough profit for a huge company like Apple to care much about your desires. They are focused like a laser on the lowest common denominator mass market consumer these days, and they are making record profits.

Know what you mean, but this type of comment is becoming almost a "meme," or part of the "conventional wisdom" on Apple Forums, and is worth clarifying, because any following "therefore......" is bound to miss its mark.

Your second conclusion (record profits) is, of course, correct, however the first is mis-stated.

Apple is not "focused like a laser on the lowest common denominator mass market consumer these days." That's the low-margin, dubious-quality, corner-cutting niche left to the Dells, HPs and Acers et al. in the PC worlds and a raft of Droid cloners in the tablet and phone markets. Those are the companies at each others' throats all fighting to serve the majority of the people of my acquaintance, who, with little brand loyalty, only know they want a computer or smart phone ("for a good price"), and who once they have one, and the bare minimum of programs to do what they need, pretty much cease buying anything for the device until it dies.

Apple's true "laser-like focus" is rather on dominating the markets for the world's "aspirational" middle to upper middle and above consumers, prosumers (and kinda are/wanna-be/think they are prosumers and pros). This may be a somewhat smaller niche than the "LDC" group - but probably gives Apple a target of a billion and half to two billion potential customers. Who are also much more likely to keep adding programs, accessories, OS upgrades, etc. to their machines after they buy 'em.

And since this group has more money to spend, more education, more time to research their more major purchases, etc., they're more willing to factor quality, form factor and design, user experience, "ecosystems," ease of use, TCO, and so forth into their buying decisions. And to spend more for their machines - even though part of the cost includes a higher mark-up - than in the frantic, churning commodity markets.

So for one thing, THAT's a major reason Apple's making record profits.

In computers, that "90% of the $1000 and above market" is a particularly telling stat. Meanwhile, in the iPad world, errr, the tablet space, even if the Kindle Fire is about to catch on fire, it'll be by being sold as a low-margin to loss-leader "razor" that will pay off by helping Amazon sell Amazon.com "blades" (programs, content and general A.com shopping), not in and of itself.

So it's a key distinction. For one thing it also helps indicate whether Apple will totally abandon some of the "creative pros" and other true geek believers who sustained it through it darkest days. I conclude that since they're NOT focused on the bottom-feeding market, and with the prosumer and pro niches being somewhat indistinguishable, pro and pro-ish configs are likely to be with us for some time, as long as they can contribute meaningfully to the bottom line.

And give those who start off at the bottom rung of the Apple tree ladder plenty of rungs to grow up through.

And for as long as Apple can remain a company focused on a slowly growing, but still manageable number of SKU's, research efforts and not accumulate too many "buggy-whip" corners and departments within its structure.

And... ...that's their laser-like focus. And an important lens to look through when you're making predictions about "what's next" for the company's product lines.

I can't count how many times I've heard people say "I'd buy a MacBook Air if it had a 15" version" People like the weight and size of it.

As an owner of a 2011 MacBook Air 11"/Core i7, I find it to be a game changer.

Even though the fans kick up a whirlwind when I'm rendering video, the combination of insane battery life and extremely light weight are just amazing. When I'm taking notes during a meeting or writing, I often get 6-7 hours on a single charge. By refusing to install Java, Flash or any other plug ins, I consistently exceed Apple's rated battery life.

I now have an early 2008 17", a 2010 15" and a 2011 11" (alongside an assortment of Mac Mini's, iPad's, iPhone's and Mac Pro's), but what I really want to see is...

1. I haven't used an optical drive in more than a year, and even that was to burn a mix CD for a friend to put on her iPod. Previously, I backed up my iTunes purchases to dual-layer DVD+R, but now that I can download them at will from iCloud...
2. A gigE port is nice, but AirDrop between Mac's is pretty good. I could live with a Thunderbolt-based gigE dongle (100mb is too slow for moving multi-gigabyte RED video files).
3. I've never used the ExpressCard port on my 17", though I often threatened to.
4. I only used FW800 for Time Machine. With iCloud, I have less to backup, and it's more convenient to backup wirelessly to my Mac Mini servers. When you don't need to back up your applications (Mac App Store) or your media (iCloud) and soon most of your documents (iCloud), were it not for the video and audio processing that I do, and the various VM's for running Windows and Linux-only tools, I could get by with a much smaller disk.

They COULD, "...add even more ports, a larger battery and even better CPUs and GPU...," but they will do the latter: "...orthey could make it thinner."

<rant omitted>

When you're done hyperventilating, remember these facts:
1. You can buy a Mac Pro with integrated optical drive and put any video card in it
2. You can buy a MacBook Pro with integrated optical drive and dedicated graphics chips
3. You can burn DVDs and Blu-Rays from external drives on any MacBook Air
4. You can author Blu-Ray discs on any Mac using Adobe Encore

I would expect that this signals a new mainstream notebook line, more capable than the Air, less expensive than the Pro.

Since the very first days of Apple, at least when Steve was around, the idea was to have a concentration on a very few products. From the very first business plan drawn up, that was a guiding principle.

Why re-introduce a product in-between two totally fine lines? You've got the MBAir. You've got the MBPro. Expanding it makes no sense, Apple-wise, as far as I can tell. It's counter-intuitive.

If you want to make a better MBAir, or a more affordable MBPro, that makes sense. That I can understand.

Ever stopped to think you might be a tiny minority? When Apple dicthed the floppy drive there were several minorities that just *needed* to have that, too.

In case you don't know, Apple doesn't operate like an accounting-driven firm (and never has in its history), offering only mass-market products that sell in the highest numbers. If that were true, they would have axed the Apple TV long ago. But they're pursuing a vision, not just a mathematical business model.

There's nothing wrong with addressing a niche.

In its darkest days, when Macs claimed only 1.7% market share, Apple was addressing a niche.

Those of us forced to admit that after the dawn of Pentium PCs, Macs could no longer truthfully make the claim that they were faster than Windows PCs; when Mac quality control had grown so poor that 1 in 3 Macs were DOA and had to be returned for one that worked (I bought a Mac that was DOA and had to be exchanged twice "Third time's the charm"; when Mac OS crashed every 15 minutes; when extension conflicts beset the OS; We, "The Mac Faithful" continued to buy Macs (and often suffered ridicule) out of unwavering loyalty, sparing Apple "by the skin of its teeth" from going out of business or being sold to Oracle, Sun or IBM, where it would be subsumed out of existence and no longer be Apple.

I almost think Apple owes us. For, had we not barely sustained it with the small trickle of revenue that our unflagging "niche" supplied, Apple as we know it today would surely not exist or exist at all.

And your unsupported "guess" that the Pro market is a niche too small to allocate development, marketing, advertising and promotion dollars would seem to be refuted by the empirical evidence:

The Mac Pro is not selling because Apple has abandoned it. You can get a far more powerful graphics card in an iMac, but have just two cards to choose from for the Mac Pro. Every Mac now features SATA III 6G except the Mac Pro. Ditto Thunderbolt.

Its Industrial design hasn't changed since 2003.

When you choke off the blood supply to a product, you shouldn't be scratching your head when it dies. It's very simple.

You neglect a product, let it go "stale" and sales drop off?! WTF?

The Mac Pro will die as a direct consequence of its neglect of the product, and lack of promotion. Many people don't even know there's a Mac Pro; Apple's "promotion" is almost covert.

Quote:

Originally Posted by foljs

The MB Airs sell like hot cakes. People don't seem bothered by the lack of an optical drive at all. And why should they?

The MacBook Pro is a whole 0.71 inches thicker than a MacBook Air that's less than one-quarter of one inch! (Oh, my!)

Quote:

Originally Posted by foljs

You pine for the days of "replacable batteries"? Ever stopped to think that in those days a MBP (or Powerbook) gave you like 2-3 hours battery time, and now it gives like 7 out of the box?

Yes, I have. But it's a non sequitur to suggest that detachable batteries would stand still in terms of battery life, and only internal batteries would increase in battery life. Detachable batteries would benefit from the advancements in battery life technologies just the same and, most importantly, would be THINNER!

Would you want your digital camera to have an enclosed, fixed capacity memory card and no slot if it made it.....thinner?

The 17" doesn't seem that popular these days. If they're going for the ultra thin thing, 32GB of ram may not be seen for 3-4 years on such a machine. Getting that much battery life with such a large display is also something that would take more than one refresh cycle.

There's only one thing that I find really silly. So many of you guys seem to think the discreet gpu model will make it into these ultra thin machines. Intel has been pushing their own integrated graphics here. Don't expect to see more than that. They have a really strict power budget when it comes to preventing such a thin machine from overheating.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Suddenly Newton

When you're done hyperventilating, remember these facts:
1. You can buy a Mac Pro with integrated optical drive and put any video card in it
2. You can buy a MacBook Pro with integrated optical drive and dedicated graphics chips
3. You can burn DVDs and Blu-Rays from external drives on any MacBook Air
4. You can author Blu-Ray discs on any Mac using Adobe Encore

Optical drives may soon be a thing of the past on macs completely. Even with the mac pro its gpu range is fairly limited. It may only be two to three years before macbook pros only come with integrated graphics. Intel seems to be pushing this model. Mobile gpus in a conservative tdp aren't that powerful anyway.

When you're done hyperventilating, remember these facts:
1. You can buy a Mac Pro with integrated optical drive and put any video card in it
2. You can buy a MacBook Pro with integrated optical drive and dedicated graphics chips
3. You can burn DVDs and Blu-Rays from external drives on any MacBook Air
4. You can author Blu-Ray discs on any Mac using Adobe Encore

0. Don't mistake passion for insulting characterizations. (Please.)

1. So, according to these "facts," I can put ANY GPU card in it? Besides the overcrowded TWO graphics card options, I can slip any graphics card in there without an unsanctioned "hack" that would surely meet with compatibility/stability issues, or even prevent the installation of a future version of Mac OS X that does a preinstall-hardware check? Does Apple's unique use of some of a graphics card's contact points matter? Or Apple's requirement for a non-standard firmware flash memory size?

And I can insert a second card (or up to four) and take advantage of nVidia's SLI or AMD/ATi's CrossFireX parallel GPU processing power, (crying out for OpenCL and GPGPU, BTW)?

3. Which really contributes positively to the MacBook Air's "footprint" and desk real estate than would an integrated 9.5mm tall integrated optical burner.

4. No native Blu-ray support. Why can't I create a "Burn" folder or use "Disk Utility" to write data to a blank Blu-ray disc? Windows has had this capability "baked in" for awhile now.

Why can't I burn an iMovie to a Blu-ray disc? Or in the abandoned iDVD?

And, yes, you will be able to resort to third-party solutions for Blu-ray until Apple adds code to [Mac] OS X that thwarts Blu-ray support. (They've done it before! Secret APIs which left ISVs wondering why they couldn't get their apps to do things Apple apps could do until Apple got BUSTED! and had to fess up.

There is no justifiable reason for not availing Mac customers a BTO option for an integrated optical burner let alone a Blu-ray burner.

The 17" doesn't seem that popular these days. If they're going for the ultra thin thing, 32GB of ram may not be seen for 3-4 years on such a machine. Getting that much battery life with such a large display is also something that would take more than one refresh cycle.

There's only one thing that I find really silly. So many of you guys seem to think the discreet gpu model will make it into these ultra thin machines. Intel has been pushing their own integrated graphics here. Don't expect to see more than that. They have a really strict power budget when it comes to preventing such a thin machine from overheating.

Optical drives may soon be a thing of the past on macs completely. Even with the mac pro its gpu range is fairly limited. It may only be two to three years before macbook pros only come with integrated graphics. Intel seems to be pushing this model. Mobile gpus in a conservative tdp aren't that powerful anyway.

No optical drive on my iMac would be a deal killer for me (I'd hold onto my 2010 for a long time). No optical drive on a MacBook? Great. Save the weight and gimme room. I don't see the optical drive leaving the iMac anytime soon- they aren't hurting for space- particularly @ 27".

Like USB was promising until Apple used it and then the PC bandwagon was suddenly spilling over with PC makers FINALLY adopting USB after Intel had long since ratified it and shopped it around to every PC maker for two years (with not a single taker).

Quote:

Originally Posted by foljs

Hmm. You understand the contradiction of accusing Apple of "stopping all research" and then mentioning Apple+Intel's own Thunderbolt, the nicest new I/O port spec to come out for PCs lately.

No, I don't understand, because that's not what I said. Apple wants all research into OPTICAL STORAGE TECHNOLOGY outlawed, not "all research."

And the systematic disappearance of integrated optical drives in Macs is a subset of a larger effort: to kill the physical, optical format in every incarnation by undermining its support. Optical drive-less Macs is a pretty good means.

Apple's external SuperDrive is a placating, perfunctory offering that will get yanked as soon as things settle down. Apple wants all software and all content to be delivered wirelessly and exist digitally – AND, naturally, be bought from the iTunes Store only.

Quote:

Originally Posted by foljs

Let's face it, you are just a lover of clunky, bulky, laptops, better served with an Alienware monstrocity!

I don't "face" false, supercilious sarcasm. Yeah, that's right, I really do want a clunky, bulky laptop thicker than a hard cover copy of "War and Peace," and the size of a suitcase. And I want it to weigh more than a box of mail order frozen meat.

My (you would think) innocuous point is that the MacBook is thin enough already, and if this pointless, manic, obsessive, never-ending pursuit of ever-thinness means jettisoning a more powerful CPU, graphics hardware, RAM space, storage space, battery life, expandability, and, yes, an integrated optical burner (BTO, if necessary), then "form" has truly overtaken "function," and I'm not willing to accept those compromises all in the interest of still further thinness.

Reason needs to enter the equation. Is that too much to ask? Is that "unreasonable"?

Doubtful on better CPUs and GPUs. As a owner of the current 2011 MacBook Pro, it's pretty obvious that the cooling system wasn't designed for 45W TDP CPUs, and a thinner enclosure won't help that problem. If anything, I expect then to lower the TDP with a cooler chip and focus on battery life. I hope they hake the 1680x1050 res screen standard.

This looks about right. But when the 11" and 13" Airs get Ivy Bridge, they'll be as powerful as today's MacBook Pros. The distinction between the two product lines seems as if it will diminish. If this is right, I wonder if the new line-up will be called simply MacBooks?

The answer may lie in whether the 17" model is replaced with a new thinner version. If it is, then the dual line will probably be retained. If not, and Apple just offers 11", 13" and 15" models, then expect a single line-up.

To release a 15" MacBook Air without Ivy Bridge is probably pointless.

Detachable batteries would benefit from the advancements in battery life technologies just the same – and, most importantly, would be THINNER!

Detachable batteries are certainly not thinner than the integrated batteries found in Apple products. You have more casing involved and space lost to make them into big rectangles, space which Apple uses for more battery.

According to Intel, Ivy Bridge is supposed to be about 20% faster CPU and 60% faster GPU, plus the GPU is being bumped from DX10 to DX11 support. Games like World of Warcraft got a 30% bump in performance after they coded DX11 benefits into the game. The TDP of the new chips is much lower and there is talk that w/the variable TDP of the chips, we'll see things like (for example) a 35W capable processor that runs at 15W until it is plugged into a docking unit, which has better cooling options and more power. Heck, even if the processor throttled up when it was plugged in vs when unplugged would be interesting.

You not being able to think of one or refusing to accept one doesn't mean there isn't.

As a BTO option?

Choice?

Giving buyers the self-determination to decide for themselves? Freedom?

Don't want an integrated optical drive? Order a Mac without one. How is that wrong?

But, again, the systematic elimination of integrated optical drives in Macs is a subset of an overarching goal: to kill the physical, optical media format – whether you like it or not.

In the Mac's future (besides running iOS on the ARM architecture that the Newton used in 1987, but has vastly improved over the decades a la i386, and not being called "Macs"), is no optical support. Providing optical support will violate the terms of the SDK.

No optical drive on my iMac would be a deal killer for me (I'd hold onto my 2010 for a long time). No optical drive on a MacBook? Great. Save the weight and gimme room. I don't see the optical drive leaving the iMac anytime soon- they aren't hurting for space- particularly @ 27".

They removed it from the mini already. I think they've been feeling people out here.

Or just take care of them. I don't have a single optical disc that is unreadable. I just make sure that they are either 1.) in my Mac or other device, or 2.) in a double-sided plastic sleeve with microfiber cloth in-between. In one of those two states only. No exceptions.

Or burn a second "insurance" copy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tallest Skil

...which takes an inexcusable amount of time to access any sector. Sounds great.

Huh? Volume access speeds will sit at a technological standstill? Thunderbolt won't get faster over time?

Years ago, Intel did a demonstration of Thunderbolt on a modified Mac Pro. They transferred the entire contents of a Blu-ray movie disc in 30 seconds.

And are you against terabytes? Hope not, because you're gonna hate petabytes.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tallest Skil

You can buy an optical drive if you really want one. There's nothing stopping you from doing that.

Oh, but I fear being complicit in perpetuating a format Apple is trying to kill.

I fully agree with Jobs opinion that the future of the macbook is the air form factor. I've been criticized for saying this, mainly by MBP owners who can't stand the future is thinner than their machine. But start to get used to it, because that's the future. And no, you won't lose performance, you'll have better performance, with a lightweight thin design, because that's what people wants, even if you're in love with heavy laptops. The only thing you'll lose is the uncomfortable weight which turns laptops into "half-desktop" machines.

So don't be sad... your next laptop will be extremely light, while really powerful. That's very good news to me, and I don't understand the criticism about this.

Huh? Volume access speeds will sit at a technological standstill? Thunderbolt won't get faster over time?

Thunderbolt is an interconnect, not a storage technology.

Quote:

Years ago, Intel did a demonstration of Thunderbolt on a modified Mac Pro. They transferred the entire contents of a Blu-ray movie disc in 30 seconds.

Wow. That's impressive. Care to point to the Blu-ray drive they used that can output that kind of data that fast? Oh, wait. What you actually meant to say was, "they transferred an amount of data equivalent to the contents of an entire Blu-ray disc in thirty seconds." Try to spot the difference.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ecs

I fully agree with Jobs opinion that the future of the macbook is the air form factor. I've been criticized for saying this, mainly by MBP owners who can't stand the future is thinner than their machine. But start to get used to it, because that's the future. And no, you won't lose performance, you'll have better performance, with a lightweight thin design, because that's what people wants, even if you're in love with heavy laptops. The only thing you'll lose is the uncomfortable weight which turns laptops into "half-desktop" machines.

So don't be sad... your next laptop will be extremely light, while really powerful. That's very good news to me, and I don't understand the criticism about this.

The current crop of ultra-thin laptops (MacBook Air) cuts corners to achieve thinness. There is still a need for full-feature laptops at the professional level. Plentiful storage (HDD) andFireWire (at least until Thunderbolt-to FireWire solutions actually ship; video and audio professionals need FireWire). MacBook Pro's will get thinner, but for now, the Airs cannot replace them.

I fully agree with Jobs opinion that the future of the macbook is the air form factor. I've been criticized for saying this, mainly by MBP owners who can't stand the future is thinner than their machine. But start to get used to it, because that's the future. And no, you won't lose performance, you'll have better performance, with a lightweight thin design, because that's what people wants, even if you're in love with heavy laptops. The only thing you'll lose is the uncomfortable weight which turns laptops into "half-desktop" machines.

So don't be sad... your next laptop will be extremely light, while really powerful. That's very good news to me, and I don't understand the criticism about this.

If intel hits their targets you may see the pros go to thinned down form factors in 2013 seeing as the goal was 17W cpus by that time. If they do go this route discreet graphics will be highly unlikely. I hope they ditch the wedge concept in a thinned out macbook pro. To me more ports would be preferable. You can never be sure with Apple. Several wireless standards have been proposed for wireless usb/displayport standards. I don't know if/when we'll see something like that in actual products. SSD sizes really need to increase for these to be practical drives for primary computers. The cloud isn't the answer to everything with bandwidth constraints.

If intel hits their targets you may see the pros go to thinned down form factors in 2013 seeing as the goal was 17W cpus by that time. If they do go this route discreet graphics will be highly unlikely. I hope they ditch the wedge concept in a thinned out macbook pro. To me more ports would be preferable. You can never be sure with Apple. Several wireless standards have been proposed for wireless usb/displayport standards. I don't know if/when we'll see something like that in actual products. SSD sizes really need to increase for these to be practical drives for primary computers. The cloud isn't the answer to everything with bandwidth constraints.

I've an iMac, but my late-2010 MBA (13'', 4GB RAM, 256GB SSD) has become my primary computer. I'm now doing big drawings with AutoCAD 2011 (last update applied) and it's as responsive as my 2010 iMac (or even better). Also, the 256GB SSD it came with is very adequate for me: I admit I couldn't work with a 128GB SSD, and also I'd prefer a 512GB one, but the 256GB is big enough for use in a primary computer.

My OpenGL apps also work very sweet with this NVIDIA GPU (it's integrated, however, but runs fine).

Sure, a quad-core would be more powerful, but if I can use a late-2010 MBA for primary use, I'm very sure that the hypothetical 15'' thin macbook in this rumor can be an awesome machine for whatever task you use your MBP.

I fully agree with Jobs opinion that the future of the macbook is the air form factor. I've been criticized for saying this, mainly by MBP owners who can't stand the future is thinner than their machine.

The MBP is not a Mac Book.

As to being criticized I'm not sure what you mean as I've not seen many of your posts. In any event you have pulled out the wrong issue here, MBP owners are concerned about the possible loss in performance versus what could be. Further they are concerned about expansion capability and maintainability. Ship a 15" AIR without the ability to up RAM or access the storage modules and people will be perturbed.

Quote:

But start to get used to it, because that's the future. And no, you won't lose performance, you'll have better performance,

You will most certainly lose performance. Not against old hardware but rather against what is possible with a given state of the art at anyone time. The simple fact is that a higher wattage chip will generally run faster compared to other family members.

Quote:

with a lightweight thin design, because that's what people wants, even if you're in love with heavy laptops. The only thing you'll lose is the uncomfortable weight which turns laptops into "half-desktop" machines.

You aren't one of those 99 lb weaklings from Europe, are you? People carry around what is required to get the job done. Lighter is always nice but not at the expense of performance.

Quote:

So don't be sad... your next laptop will be extremely light, while really powerful. That's very good news to me, and I don't understand the criticism about this.

Mainly because you don't seem to understand what you are talking about. Just about every recent generation of processors from Intel have gotten cooler. That part you seem to grasp, what you fail to realize is that higher wattage processors do give you better performance over lower wattage parts. It is all about clock rate.
a

You will most certainly lose performance. Not against old hardware but rather against what is possible with a given state of the art at anyone time. The simple fact is that a higher wattage chip will generally run faster compared to other family members.

Unless the TDP for all Intel mobile chips becomes lower, which is the plan. More power and longer battery life are going hand in hand and we'll all be better for it. Within the next couple of generations, it won't be teh case that the thinner systems are using lower TDP processors, all the processors will be at that lower TDP.

Quote:

Originally Posted by wizard69

You aren't one of those 99 lb weaklings from Europe, are you? People carry around what is required to get the job done. Lighter is always nice but not at the expense of performance.

Weak people only live in Europe? Who knew? I think the people who complain about a 3 lb laptop instead of a 2 lb laptop are really big whiners tho, so I'm not disputing the basic point.

You will most certainly lose performance. Not against old hardware but rather against what is possible with a given state of the art at anyone time. The simple fact is that a higher wattage chip will generally run faster compared to other family members.

Their targets are to get high performance from low wattage. Also saying performance depends on the wattage alone is completely batty. i5 and i7 CPUs are the same wattage yet the i7 performs better. Funny how that works.

Quote:

Originally Posted by wizard69

You aren't one of those 99 lb weaklings from Europe, are you?

So tempted to pull the "All dem yanks be fat!" card... oh so tempted.

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Originally Posted by wizard69

People carry around what is required to get the job done. Lighter is always nice but not at the expense of performance.

Really? My dad has a HP ProBook. Its very heavy and very big. My slimmer and lighter MacBook Pro out-performs it. Funny how that works.

Also, the Intel Atom is a low Wattage processor (typically) at 1.6GHz. The ARM CPUs in portable devices like the iPad and Smart Phones run at much lower clock rates (1.0GHz) and much lower wattage, yet they appear to out-perform the Atom, or are at least on par with it. Funny how that works.

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Originally Posted by wizard69

Mainly because you don't seem to understand what you are talking about.

And you do? Could've fooled me...

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Originally Posted by wizard69

Just about every recent generation of processors from Intel have gotten cooler. That part you seem to grasp, what you fail to realize is that higher wattage processors do give you better performance over lower wattage parts. It is all about clock rate.

Firstly, I refer you back to my Atom v ARM statement.

Secondly, All about clock rate? You have NO idea how a processor works if you base it all on clock rate. By that logic the 2.0GHz Quad i7 in my MBP should be slower in single thread operations than the Single Core AMD V-140 in my Compaq CQ56. Strangely enough, its not! Funny how that works. You also contradict yourself; first by saying higher wattage leads to higher performance, then suddenly claiming its all about clock rate that is independent of the wattage. So which is it, then?

A Processor's ability to process data is based on the number of transistors, architecture (sandy-bridge, K10 etc.), cache, on-chip features, instruction-set features (eg: SSE4) and so on. The raw clock rate hasn't been a significant factor in determining processor performance since the 90s - it all depends on how many calculations the processor can perform per clock cycle.

A fantastic example of this is the Emotion Engine (EE) CPU in the Playstation 2. The EE was only clocked at 294~299Mhz, yet it out performed the original xbox's 700MHz CPU. Why? The xbox used a scalar processor (Single Instruction, Single Data) where the EE was a Superscalar CPU (Multiple Instructions, Multiple Data) with an on die Vector Processing Unit to operate on several data items in one clock cycle, rather than a single operation per cycle like in "traditional" CPUs. (on a side note, why don't intel get off their backsides and make a true Vector Processor? The performance would be astronomical!)

Well, mine ramp up too (sorry if I wasn't clear on that). When I first got the laptop, I was installing Toast 11 and it did something similar with the CPU usage and next thing I know, the fans are whirring away at 6000+ RPM. Otherwise, it'll take a video encode to make them go crazy like that. Thanks for the feedback BTW.

Have you installed the SMC update? If so maybe reset the SMC on next startup.

Oh, heaven's no. I wouldn't even do that yet. I don't particularly like cloud computing for anything but device content parity.

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I just make sure that they are either 1.) in my Mac or other device, or 2.) in a double-sided plastic sleeve with microfiber cloth in-between. In one of those two states only. No exceptions.

*applause* You're better at taking care of discs than I am. I don't have anything unreadable either (nor do I have any disc that has died of "old age", despite some being a decade or more old), so good on you.

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Years ago, Intel did a demonstration of Thunderbolt on a modified Mac Pro. They transferred the entire contents of a Blu-ray movie disc in 30 seconds.

Exactly. Movies will eventually be sold on Thunderbolt flash drives and plugged into TVs with Thunderbolt ports. They'll have the most draconian DRM the planet has ever seen, but their access times will be far superior to Blu-ray.

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And are you against terabytes? Hope not, because you're gonna hate petabytes.

I'm just against putting so MUCH information in such a fragile package.

Really? My dad has a HP ProBook. Its very heavy and very big. My slimmer and lighter MacBook Pro out-performs it. Funny how that works.

Also, the Intel Atom is a low Wattage processor (typically) at 1.6GHz. The ARM CPUs in portable devices like the iPad and Smart Phones run at much lower clock rates (1.0GHz) and much lower wattage, yet they appear to out-perform the Atom, or are at least on par with it. Funny how that works.

That comparison lacks a lot of context. Were they similar hardware generations and builds (ram, HD, etc), and did you have a real basis of comparison? There's no way of knowing what you were running or anything. Windows actually does offer superior performance in certain things. My biggest complaint with most laptops remains that they run too hot if pushed for performance.

Intel already announced their plans for the Atom. I wouldn't call it a foregone conclusion just yet.

Oh, heaven's no. I wouldn't even do that yet. I don't particularly like cloud computing for anything but device content parity.

I'm just against putting so MUCH information in such a fragile package.

So, answer-boy, just what is your solution for archiving large amounts of data, accessed too infrequently to encumber and slow down your HDD or SSD?

For a Professional Photographer with an 18 megapixel DSLR and countless RAW files (+ non-destruct originals) of (minumum) 10MB per photo, and who has terabytes of this data he needs to keep should a client ask for a print any time in the future, what's your answer for massive archival needs on a Mac?

Exactly. Movies will eventually be sold on Thunderbolt flash drives and plugged into TVs with Thunderbolt ports. They'll have the most draconian DRM the planet has ever seen, but their access times will be far superior to Blu-ray.

Nope. Physical is in the past; quit dwelling on the past. Movies will only exist as electronic downloads or streams from the iTunes Store. (BTW, how much would a Thunderbolt flash drive movie cost in comparison to a DVD? A 32GB USB Flash drive already costs more than some 500GB hard drives.)

I'm still waiting for some recommendations on the "any" graphics card you said I can plop into my Mac Pro, besides the 1GB Radeon HD 5770 or 5880 OH, snap! I forgot, there's also the $1,200 nVidia Quadro 4000 Mac Edition (which Apple doesn't provide OpenCL support for and which causes kernel panics more than once a day).

So, my credit card is in hand: recommend some of the "any" graphics cards you said I can use in my Mac Pro besides the aforementioned. I'm waaaaaiiiiiiting!

So, answer-boy, just what is your solution for archiving large amounts of data, accessed too infrequently to encumber and slow down your HDD or SSD?

For a Professional Photographer with an 18 megapixel DSLR and countless RAW files (+ non-destruct originals) of (minumum) 10MB per photo, and who has terabytes of this data he needs to keep should a client ask for a print any time in the future, what's your answer for massive archival needs on a Mac?

HFS+ has always been F***ing garbage. I hate that stupid file system and its terrible directory issues so much, and I wouldn't even own a Mac without disk warrior. I really wish they had an alternative to that ancient piece of crap. It's the one thing I hate more in OSX than the registry in Windows.

What do you mean "now" has a 39 MP DSLR? Digital backs like the Phase One have been out in that resolution since 2006 2007? The newest is an 80MP back.

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Originally Posted by Macs2InfinityAndBeyond

I'm still waiting for some recommendations on the "any" graphics card you said I can plop into my Mac Pro, besides the 1GB Radeon HD 5770 or 5880 OH, snap! I forgot, there's also the $1,200 nVidia Quadro 4000 Mac Edition (which Apple doesn't provide OpenCL support for and which causes kernel panics more than once a day).

So, my credit card is in hand: recommend some of the "any" graphics cards you said I can use in my Mac Pro besides the aforementioned. I'm waaaaaiiiiiiting!

Yeah Apple sucks on gpus. I thought the Quadro 4000 Mac Edition was cheaper now, but they don't even have plans for 10 bit RGB out driver support. Apple is a consumer brand now. We'll all get used to it eventually. If you're a photographer, the only real advantage from a workstation grade GPU you're going to get in Photoshop or capture programs would be 10 bit video out assuming a compatible display. You really don't gain anything else from workstation gpus. They matter more for CAD, 3d modeling, etc. Photoshop is 95% cpu power. The OpenGL drawing functions don't stress a card out that much.

Exactly. Movies will eventually be sold on Thunderbolt flash drives and plugged into TVs with Thunderbolt ports. They'll have the most draconian DRM the planet has ever seen, but their access times will be far superior to Blu-ray.

You are trolling right? It doesn't actually make any sense for the proposed use.

HFS+ has always been F***ing garbage. I hate that stupid file system and its terrible directory issues so much, and I wouldn't even own a Mac without disk warrior. I really wish they had an alternative to that ancient piece of crap. It's the one thing I hate more in OSX than the registry in Windows.

Unfortunately, indications point to a lack of motivation or committment to improve "non-user-facing" changes to [Mac] OS X. If we're lucky, more chewing gum and Band-Aids to HFS+, at the most. I just don't think Apple CARES, unless it's "iOSifying" [Mac] OS X.

I think Lion, ironically the biggest of the big cats, may be the end-of-the-road. 10.7.9 is probably they extent of what we can hope for.

It's a shame about ZFS. In a prioritized list of file systems, it was like:

"The limitations of ZFS are designed to be so large that they would never be encountered. This was assured by surpassing physical rather than theoretical limitations—there simply is not enough usable matter on the planet Earth to support a maximized ZFS filesystem." (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZFS.)

2. N/A
3. N/A
4. Btrfs – ZFS "pretender," but falls far short.
5. N/A
6. N/A
7. N/A
8. ReiserFS (but since its creator, Hans Reiser, murdered his wife and is serving 15 to life in prison, relying on this file system might not be a good idea for technical reasons and PR reasons).
9. N/A
10. N/A
11. N/A
12. ext4 – a FAR cry from all the aforementioned, but is used by many current Unixes and Linuxes, and Google recently opted to drop their proprietary FS and go with ext. If ZFS and Btrfs are simply impossibilities for [Mac] OS X, at least Apple would be using a more standardized FS. IDK, but it could allow Unix apps to run on [Mac] OS X more easily or be more easily ported. File exchange or transfer standardization could benefit [Mac] OS X. And, without turning it proprietary, I wonder if Apple could create XSan and Xgrid "extensions" for it that would not break compatibility. And would only be available to Mac users!

But, the fewer number of different file systems, the better. We can count on Microsoft not to change, but if Unixes, Linuxes, Google OSes and [Mac] OS X all used the same file system, I think it would be Good Thing™.

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Originally Posted by hmm

What do you mean "now" has a 39 MP DSLR? Digital backs like the Phase One have been out in that resolution since 2006 2007? The newest is an 80MP back.

I-DID-NOT-KNOW-THAT. Fortifies my point by 200%.

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Originally Posted by hmm

Yeah Apple sucks on gpus. I thought the Quadro 4000 Mac Edition was cheaper now, but they don't even have plans for 10 bit RGB out driver support. Apple is a consumer brand now. We'll all get used to it eventually. If you're a photographer, the only real advantage from a workstation grade GPU you're going to get in Photoshop or capture programs would be 10 bit video out assuming a compatible display. You really don't gain anything else from workstation gpus. They matter more for CAD, 3d modeling, etc. Photoshop is 95% cpu power. The OpenGL drawing functions don't stress a card out that much.

Spot on. Can't add much more to that except this article. It is pertinent in its entirety, but the section that reads, The Problem of Apple, is particularly relevant – and they weren't even talking about the extremely limited number of different cards Apple supports!